Recap: NY Islanders vs. Dallas

Uniondale, NY (SportsNetwork.com) - Frans Nielsen's third-period hat trick helped the New York Islanders to a 7-5 win over the Dallas Stars on Saturday.

With the game tied at 4-4 after two periods, Nielsen started his surge as he finished a 2-on-1 rush with a goal at the 9:39 mark. He then received a pass from Mikhail Grabovski on another 2-on-1 break and wristed the puck past Anders Lindback for a 6-4 lead 5 1/2 minutes later.

Shawn Horcoff cut the deficit in half when he beat Chad Johnson only 23 seconds after Nielsen's second tally, but the native of Denmark capped the night on an empty netter with one-tenth of a second left.

Anders Lee, Nikolay Kulemin, Brock Nelson and Lubomir Visnovsky each added a goal for New York, which has won two straight on the heels of a two-game skid.

Johnson made 26 saves in the win for the Metropolitan Division leaders.

"You get the two points however you win...but you can't rely on scoring (seven) goals," Johnson said. "I want to be better and make some more saves."

Lee got things going 5:11 into the first when he tipped in Thomas Hickey's shot from the left circle.

Vernon Fiddler knotted the score later in the period after he threw one on net that squeaked through Johnson's pads.

Kulemin gave the Islanders another lead late in the first, and Nelson added to it with a wrist shot as Lindback couldn't control the original shot by Ryan Strome 1:25 into the second for a 3-1 New York lead.

Lindback stopped 22 shots for Dallas, which had its two-game winning streak snapped.

"I have to be better than that," Lindback admitted.

The Stars took the lead with three straight goals from there. Tyler Seguin, who finished with a goal and an assist, scored four minutes after Nelson to cut the deficit to one.

Jason Spezza tied the game on the power play 1:25 later, blasting a shot past Johnson from the left circle off a feed from Alex Goligoski, who finished with two helpers.

Goligoski threw a shot on net that hit the post, and Antoine Roussel was out in front to put the rebound in for a 4-3 advantage.

The lead didn't last long, however, as Visnovsky tied the game 30 seconds later to into the final stanza.

Game Notes

Grabovski had two assists in the win ... Dallas went 1-for-5 on the power
play, while New York went 0-for-2.

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